Medtronic Makes Surprise Turn on Blood-Pressure Device

That is the headline in a WSJ story by Joseph Walker today. Here is a link but a subscription is required.

Trials for a new Medtronic blood pressure device failed…repeat, the trial failed and showed no improvement in reduction in blood pressure compared to a “sugar pill”. You’d think Medtronic would go back to the drawing board, but no. Writes Walker, “Medtronic Inc….undeterred by a surprising and definitive clinical-trial failure, said it will continue to develop its medical device for high blood pressure in hopes of winning U.S. regulatory approval.”

Something is very wrong with the FDA if Medtronic thinks it can get approval for an utterly failed device…but what’s new? It’s happened before.

If Medtronic succeeds in getting approval for this, expect to spend a lot of money on expensive new devices that work no better than a placebo.

Tom Emerick is the President of Emerick Consulting and co-founder of Edison Health. In December 2012, Tom was listed in Forbes.com as one of 13 unsung heroes changing healthcare forever. In 2009, Tom was named by Healthspottr as one of the top 100 innovators in healthcare in the US for his work on medical ethics. Prior to consulting, Tom spent a number of years working for large corporations: Walmart Stores, Burger King, and British Petroleum.

2 comments

Remember, Medtronic just made a large commitment to the monitoring industry with the purchase of Cardiocom. Since Cardiocom’s market is limited and I don’t think Medtronic understands it anyway, in order to avoid a nine-figure goodwill writedown of Cardiocom, they have to keep throwing good money after bad.